Building Walls

“You’ll find the right stone at the right time.”

We were driving through the Irish countryside on a motorcoach when our guide uttered this incredibly profound, almost prophetic word, in the midst of a simple explanation about Irish farming. He had pointed out the gorgeous stone walls that crisscross the hillsides. He said they don’t use mortar, they just stack them, and that a kid’s worst kind of Saturday was when the parents said, “Come on, kids, you’re going stone picking.”

He said that he had originally been a horticulture student and that one time he had taken a job helping landscape a farm. He wasn’t sure what the job entailed till he got there, but the overseer told him they were going to build a wall. He told the boss that he had not ever built a wall, and the boss said just to make 3 stacks of stones: round ones, square ones, and weird ones. And then just start stacking them.

“You’ll find the right stone at the right time.”

I’ve thought a lot lately about my life’s choices and paths. My freshman RTI group read “The Road Not Taken” last week and it always gets me in my feels when I think about the different ways my life has turned out than what I expected. The truth is that my preference, as a high school graduate, would have been to know precisely every step between then and now… the spouse, the kids, the career, the details of every piece of it. But gosh, what excitement I would have missed along the way if I had known! And what needless anxiety I would have carried, anticipating circumstances that led to changes of course. 

What has actually transpired in my life is that I’ve found the right stone at all the right times. 

I didn’t marry the person I thought I would. Instead, I met and married the most perfect man for me.

I didn’t have a boy, a girl, and a boy like I had hoped. Instead, I got the sweetest two girls that were heaven sent and then, when I didn’t get to adopt a son 3 years after Kelsey was born, instead I got to adopt the most perfect 3 Filipino angels that perfectly completed our family.

I didn’t become a physical therapist. Instead, I have been blessed with 25 years of a career that has fulfilled me in ways I didn’t even know I needed to be fulfilled. And then, when I was given seniors after two years of sophomores and then yearbook after 17 years away from it, and freshman RTI instead of RISE… instead I got these awesome refreshing changes that gave me just the boosts I needed when I needed them.

All of these big things, yes, and then a thousand other little things… a photography side career for the perfect ten years for it, a shirt/creation business for the exact ten years that it fit, and now a travel business that’s providing the most incredible blessings just when I need them… a ministry that I have grown up with and evolved and changed as it has, a stone that I thought I wanted but I see so clearly now was not the right one… friendships that happened the perfect times, friendships that ended in the nick of time, and friendships that renewed at the most meaningful time… roots in the places that feel made for me, from my hometown to my homestead to my home retreat of Bear Paw.

I know that these “right stones at the right times” didn’t just happen. I know that they were ordained. And stones for me have always held precious meaning, so I know that the moment on the bus the other day was a message that came from a place much deeper than a tour guide explaining the countryside. 

So today, God, in this hotel room in Killarney, Ireland, I thank you for all the times you place the right stone at the right time for me. You are so good.

Festina Lente- 2026

 The one little word/word of the year practice has always been deeply meaningful to me. I start praying about my word in mid December, and usually have a short list by Christmas. Sometimes the frontrunner is very obvious, and sometimes it takes some time to narrow it down. At times (this year is one of the “times”), it comes out of nowhere and isn’t even on the short list.

This year’s short list was:

Anchor, breathe, elevate or higher, celebrate, meliora (good, toward better things), stand, and memento vivere (remember to live)

Not on the short list, but a song title/lyric that stays with me is “Die Slower”. 

As I was looking at the Latin phrase “memento vivere”, I came across this one: Festina Lente… make haste slowly.

I knew immediately, and then when I investigated it further, I found that an anchor is often used with that phrase, which further solidified it for me (since anchor was another word on my list. Plus memento vivere AND die slower fit perfectly with this phrase.

What does make haste slowly mean? Why this phrase for 2026?

My 2025 word, align, was incredibly powerful for me. And while I brought things into alignment this past year, there are still ends to pull together and I need to maintain a lot of what I started that may not yet be a routine. 

This year, I’m feeling called to, as one of my daughters said the other day, “be where my feet are”. It’s important to me that I seize all the moments and remember to live, but that I keep anchored with the lessons and systems and rhythms and disciplines that held me this past year. I want to take advantage of every opportunity, but keep the priorities in order. I want to hold to every bit of quality time with my people but also handle my business. I want to keep my health in a state that allows for a life I want to live. 

I am and have always been a person of extremes. I’m either all in, or I’m not in at all. I live sometimes with urgency, as if I’ve been given a death sentence (which, I guess, technically, haven’t we all?) and I have to cram everything possible into every moment. Then other times I can’t find the motivation to do anything. Decisions paralyze me. Fatigue of planning and executing brings me to a full stop. 

This year, I want to focus on making haste but doing it steadily and correctly. Balance. Anchored. Living. 

As I reread this, I feel like it’s a scattered explanation, but I feel it in my spirit. The depth of understanding in my very soul is perhaps beyond mere words, beyond an ability to convey it to anyone else. As has often happened in the past, I absolutely believe that the word and message and meaning will take better shape as the Lord reveals to me what He wants to show me with this year’s word, and I am eager (and always a little apprehensive) to live this one out.

2025 Reflections

 My most recent blog post (from February) says that I set a goal for one blog a month for 2025. 3 out of 12? Not the best. 😂 Luckily, though, in my year of the word “Align”, the writing category (including blogging) was my least successful, and really only just totally unsuccessful. Everything else, as far as my goals and my word, really fulfilled the purpose I think God set forth when He gave me that word.

I had said in my January 2025 post that alignment isn’t something enjoyable when it’s happening, but it feels very good once it’s done. Well, I am pleased to report that, in fact, alignment CAN feel good as it’s happening, can be enjoyable. I feel like, in a year that could have been a lot harder than it actually felt, the pretty rigorous structure and routines I put into place for myself can be credited with my survival. Shockingly, I thoroughly enjoyed the physical disciplines I instituted. I can say that I have consumed more water in 2025 than I have in my life (probably combined, haha!). I feel very thankful for my 2025 word and the ways it gave me a scaffolding to hold to when the ground was uneven and shaky.

This year brought lots and lots of health challenges for my parents and Kraig’s mom. My dad had another potentially life-ending physical emergency, a bilateral brain bleed in October (followed by a second one) that meant my sister and I rotated a week at a time in Nashville at the hospital/hotel with him and mom for over a month. Mom had fallen on Labor Day weekend at the cabin and broke her arm (seeing her fall, I can tell you that a broken arm only is a complete miracle). Kraig’s mom is struggling through some medical needs and waiting for test results from doctor appointments. If these situations have proven anything to me, it’s that your window of time to live the life you work for (thus far, I’ve parented for 21 years and taught for 25, and I’m excited to get to the point where I can reap the rewards of those years of work and time I put in and travel and do the things I’ve worked for) could be a very narrow space, and you better do the things you want while your body will allow it.

The first half of 2025, which was the second half of the 2024-2025 school year, was very difficult professionally. Thankful the second half of the school year went better than the first half had, but I questioned a lot of things last year. However, in the most amazing little God-wink (shoot, it wasn’t a wink, it was a full-on God-pat on the back!), I had a 100% pass rate on my AP test, something that had never happened in my 23 years of teaching the class. We finished the most incredible yearbook yet and started the NEXT most incredible yearbook yet, with the greatest staff and editors I could ask for. This current school year, largely due to a wonderful state decision to disallow cell phones, has been great. I have some of the sweetest classes and kids. And of course my lunch bunch and my hexmates and my school besties are the BEST and such a blessing! 

My travel work… just wow. I finished 2024 on a business high that even I was shocked by, but I had worked HARD AND OFTEN in 2024. I felt as if I worked two full-time jobs in 2024 and I told my travel boss/friend, Tara, and Kraig not to expect that level of sales from me in 2025 because I can’t work that much on a second job. Well… I didn’t. I don’t feel like I worked nearly as many hours in 2025, but…. Somehow I topped last year’s sales by a LOT. I think it all comes down to improving my work flow (align) and just getting better at everything I’m working on. So that’s been a tremendous gift.

Physically, I’m so proud of myself. You can’t tell a bit of it by looking at me (although I’m not gonna lie, about a month ago, someone asked a relative of mine about me, “She’s not taking those shots, is she?” and I’ll be honest— I think I peaked in that moment. For someone to think I’m taking ozempic— that’s pretty much the compliment of a lifetime, haha!), but my body is better off than it’s been maybe ever. I had a personal trainer from January to June and she was an absolute TREASURE in regard to strength training. Then in August, I recommitted to my walking from 2021 and walked almost every day from August to now. I even cut back on coke! My water intake was STELLAR, I kept to my intermittent fasting, and Kraig and I cut down on our eating out. The year of aligning physically was actually FUN (I’m as shocked as the next guy) and I’m excited to get back at it this year.

Spiritually, it was definitely touch and go. We started the year strong with the Bible Recap and reading, and then fell off around March. However, even though my daily reading didn’t hold strong, it was still a year of feeling close to the Lord and giving Him praise for His incredible gifts. I did some Bible studies and did something new for me, listening to praise and worship every day on my drive in. 

It was a really special and big year for our family, as we welcomed a new son by marriage (and our extended families where we welcomed new cousins by marriage on both sides!). It was the year of weddings, for sure. I told Kraig today, we started actively planning the wedding in January and my guest room still has stuff that needs to be sold, so I guess the wedding truly consumed 2025. I’m so proud of Emma for the ways she handled a year of lots of change and adulting. She graduated college in May, double major of HR and business management. She got married in June, moved to Gallatin in August (after a July of trips), and is waiting for the results of her latest interview for a big girl job. Nolan is finishing the Nashville Metro Police Academy in January, and has absolutely killed it!

Francisco has had another great year of maintaining all the rebuilding he had done. He also had a HUGE event in that he gained his citizenship in November! It was so exciting and a great load off of all of us. Roman is in his senior year at Lee, waiting on his last praxis score (he passed all but ONE on the FIRST TRY, which is wild!) in order to student teach in the fall. Because he missed the required score on the last one, he will have to take a gap semester right this spring, but he’s going to sub and we believe God’s Hand is at work in this delay. He has worked at the Y again all year and did some camp ministry this summer. Angela finished plebe year (praise the Lord!) and got to be at home 2 days for the wedding. She has had a good first semester of 3C year, passed her classes, and got to have her whole Christmas break this year. Kelsey did her practicum with kindergartners and had great grades the end of last year and first of this one. She was also named President of her sorority for the coming year. We are super proud of all of our kids!

Kraig had another year of training and success. He finished his first actual Ironman 70.3 in Augusta in September. He did SO WELL and really had the bug now. He’s registered for Portland, Oregon, in the summer and if it goes well, he’s planning on trying for a full. He also got a promotion at work and is now a vice-president in his company. He’s really excelling at his second half century of life, haha! 

It was the most awesome year for travel. Angela and I went on a cruise to Germany, Belgium, France, and England in March and I stopped at Copenhagen on the way home. We LOVED that trip. In May, Emma and I took a graduation trip to Croatia for her college. It was such a special time to be with her, before she left for her new life. We had Bear Paw, I took yerds to St Louis for yearbook camp, we visited our kids in Gallatin, Cookeville, and Annapolis in August and September. Then Emma and Kelsey came with us to Augusta for Kraig’s triathlon, which was so fun. Mine and Kraig’s fall break trip this year was huge… we did a Hawaiian cruise for our 25th wedding anniversary. A blast! We did two weekend trips in December, a weekend in NYC and the Army-Navy game in Annapolis/Baltimore. Travel is what breathes life into me, and I had a lot of life in 2025.

Kraig and I celebrated 25 years together, which was a definite high of 2025. We look forward to many more years together!

Overall, even with the hard, 2025 was a great one. I am thankful to Jesus for leading me into rhythms and routines that would pay off so well for me this year. He has been as He always is… faithful and true and kind. 

Here’s to a new one, in a few hours! 

An Unwieldy Character

 I've been wanting to write for several days, and I have given myself the goal of writing at least one blog post a month in 2025, so tonight I sat down with my laptop and opened my blog dashboard.

But then, instead of writing, I read. I read post after post, so many things and moments and feelings I had forgotten. I cried. I cried as I reread about Grandmother's ICU stay and posts about my kids who are now moved out and gone on to make their own lives. I reflected. I reflected on lessons that the Lord has shown me through Scripture and through his lessons and through experiences. I read a post in which I talked about the 11 years of my profession I have left in front of me and that post feels like I wrote it yesterday. However, that post was 5 years ago and I have 6 years left now. 

Time is just such an unwieldy character.

I find it simultaneously shocking and not the slightest bit surprising that the amount of years to my retirement is so small. Francisco graduated from CHS 6 years ago. That event feels like a minute and a lifetime ago. I know that 2031 will feel the same way.

If things continue as they are (and we all know that is never a guarantee), the time I have left can be broken down in this way:

6 more yearbooks

6 more rounds of Holocaust Lit

6 AP classes

1 RISE group and a portion of another

6 graduations

That is mind-boggling to me. 6 is so close to single hand digits. 

I want to find ways to make the next 6 years my best yet. I don't want to grow old and bitter and hopeless and cynical. I want to end this thing on a peak, with a bang instead of a whimper. I want my final 6 years to be the ones I remember with such joy and contentment. I'm not sure what to do in order to make that happen, but that's what I'm searching for.

It’s Not My Most Exciting Word of the Year

 align

verb [ T ]

UK  

 /əˈlaɪn/ US  

to change something so that it has a correct relationship to something else

My 2025 word didn’t come to me very quickly. I had a short list of words and really was feeling more drawn to a different word (Selah). However, as I completed my 2024 reflection, I realized that (maybe inadvertently and definitely to my detriment at the time), I had really practiced Selah (a pause) in that year. However, I wasn’t pausing to reflect or to praise or to correct, I was just… paused. And I felt like it was time to fix the things that were stagnant in 2024. So another word on my short list, Align, kept coming to my spirit. 

I cannot help but feel that align is going to be… uncomfortable in the making. When your back is out of alignment it can be very painful to correct it. However, it’s also an uncomfortable and painful position to be in, so even if the practice of it brings discomfort, the relief afterward will be joyful. When your tires are out of alignment, your car drives poorly, but as soon as they fix it, the car drives perfectly again. So I guess I’m committing myself to a year of potential discomfort for the purpose of a lifetime of improved living.

I hope. That’s the idea, anyway.

I need to take this year to get things in order, to “change some things so they have a correct relationship with some other things”. And I feel like I have the tools at hand to work through that, and finally the desire, the motivation, and the understanding of the need to do so. I have a sense that this year is going to be a highly structured year, and that’s what I’ll need to hold myself to the discipline required to get better. I gave myself a lot of grace this past year, allowed myself to be held, but now it’s time to stand up and move. 

We worked a lot of puzzles this past week in West Virginia. Well, they worked a lot, I stepped in here and there to get frustrated and walk away. When I first sat down to the giant one in my picture, it was complete chaos with only part of the outer rim done. I looked around what they had done and noticed that in several places, someone had joined two pieces. Just two, not connected to the whole. I said to Kelsey that I appreciated whomever had done that because they weren’t being overwhelmed by 1000 pieces that all looked the same and were laying all over the table, they just worked till they found two that connected and started there. Then two more. Then a string of three. And eventually, those would become part of a larger picture that was forming. Over the next few days, it slowly started to come together. When we left, it was almost all done except one of the bowls. But it took the alignment of two in the beginning to get to the finished work. 

A writer I follow, Jon Acuff, has a saying from one of his books (Soundtracks, and I HIGHLY recommend it) that says, “Perfect is the enemy of done.” I get paralyzed sometimes by the enemies of done. I think if I can’t do something all the way, and immediately, I won’t do it at all. But sometimes just putting the two puzzle pieces in place… committing to improving my water intake by one full mug every day… is the impetus it takes to end up with the full puzzle completed. 

I’ll not say that I’m eager about the year ahead. It’s not very sexy, not very shiny, not very exciting, this alignment that is to come. I much prefer words from my short list like Selah and Faithful or words I keep waiting to find me like Adventure and Thrive and Bloom. However, I know that in the work there might be discomfort but in the product there is joy. So I’m committed to putting in the work.

Selah. 😜

Held.

 Held.

My 2024 word was “held”, and it was one of those years where I saw the purpose behind my word over and over and over.

The year… wasn’t awful. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t awful. 

I rang in 2024 in a hospital room in Chattanooga, sleeping in a recliner by my mom’s bed while my sister stayed home with my dad, who was also sick. And caregiving and medical things became the theme of the year. My dad had a lifechanging and lifesaving surgery (LVAD) at the end of February, and then ended up remaining in the hospital for a while, plus going back two more times after he was discharged. My mom and my sister lived in Nashville during that period and I went when I could. While my dad was there, my Grandaddy’s health was fading quickly. I tried to spend time with him when I could as well, and he did rebound for a time until he passed away at the end of the summer. Dad ended up turning a major corner and is just doing so well, his strength has come back in ways we never expected. Mom has had her health struggles this year as well, as has Kraig’s mom, some we are still working through. It’s a really strange new world, this world of aging parents, and it’s all new territory.

This was our first full year as empty nesters, and some days it’s awesome and some days it’s so sad. I do always miss my kids but I also absolutely love when they come home, plus getting to see them in their own places is so much fun. 

Angela graduated from NAPS in May and Kraig and I were able to go and see her ceremony and then fly home with her, saying goodbye to Rhode Island and trading it for Annapolis in June. Emma, Kelsey, and Nolan drove up with me to take her for I-Day and we had a good time together. It definitely made leaving her less painful for me. She survived plebe summer and then Kraig and I got to go back to see her for parents’ weekend at the end and that was a wonderful time too. We even snuck in another trip up in October for Kraig to run the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington, D.C., and his parents joined us. That was a great weekend too, since we got to see a rugby game! Angela had been home for Thanksgiving and Christmas and we have loved having her. Kelsey wrapped up freshman year at the dorm at Tech and was home for the summer, then we moved her into a cute little townhouse with 3 of her friends. She has had a great semester and is starting to get into her elementary education courses. She’s also over recruitment for her sorority and she’s big into that. Roman is halfway through his junior year at Lee and has enjoyed his observation hours and also working with kids in the aftercare. Francisco still lives across the field and works for two landscaping companies. Emma has had probably the biggest year (except maybe Angela), heading toward her college graduation with a double major in business management and HR and getting engaged in October. We are deep into the wedding planning for her and Nolan’s June wedding. 

Kraig has spent the year training. For what? Anything. He trained for a half Ironman all spring and summer, only to have it canceled due to a hurricane (the same hurricane that wreaked havoc on parts of NE TN and Virginia and NC, a historic storm). He had already done the Fall Creek Falls one. He pivoted and did the Marine Corps marathon in October and now is signed up for multiple triathlons and is planning some more marathons too. Francisco ran with him this week in WV and I think they’re planning to do some half’s this spring.

My professional year has been such a mixed bag. As far as school and teaching, the first half of 2024 was a delight and the second half was… not. 😂 I’ve struggled a lot this past semester with time management, connection, and motivation. I don’t know what’s going on but I have not enjoyed it. I’ve got some tough classes and some hard situations and I’ve let myself get in my own mind about some things and it’s made it challenging. I’m hoping that everything changes for the better next semester. We did finish one yearbook, the best one yet with the best staff and most amazing editors, then start this one (also the best one yet, also with the best staff, and also with the most amazing editors!). 

As for my travel business… wow. What a year. My goal for 2023 was to do 25% better than I did in 2022, and I don’t remember what I ended up doing it I more than met that goal. My goal for 2024 was to do 25% better than I did in 2023, and I did 62% better! I learned so much this year and really enjoyed the work. I have the best clients and hearing their happy memories of their trips when they get back is my favorite thing. I have six more years before retirement from teaching, and I hope to have travel established as a primary income by that time. More years like 2024 and I’ll be well on my way. I did have to work very hard and put a lot of time, energy, and effort into it, however. It did not happen organically. One of my specific goals was to use the phone more than email, and I definitely accomplished that. I’m pretty proud of my business year. (Which is a good thing because I would feel like a pretty big failure professionally if all I had to go on was my teaching job this year.)

I didn’t have a great year at all in regard to health and wellness, physical or mental/emotional. I honestly think I spent a lot of this year in a state of depression, which is a change from my usual anxiety, and the absolute lack of energy and motivation was tough. I didn’t walk, I didn’t hold very well to my fasting, I wasn’t committed to any kind of spiritual disciplines, and I turned to sugars for comfort. I have a lot of work to do to turn all of this around next year, but I’m going to do it.

We did a ton of traveling this year… a spring break cruise with most of my kids, visiting Angela in RI and Annapolis, Vegas, a family cruise in the summer and then a cruise for me and Kraig over fall break, Bear Paw, a travel conference in Fort Lauderdale, Key West (Dry Tortugas). We discovered the joy of weekend trips, Kraig and I did, and it’s definitely something we want to continue, I did get to check off two more national parks in Dry Tortugas and St John, USVI. Travel fills my cup and it was a great year for it.

Even in the midst of the challenging, the frustrating, the sad, the muck, and the mess ups, even when I wasn’t spending the time with Him that He deserved and desired, I can honestly say I felt “held” by the Lord this year. If I had not, I don’t know that I would be able to label this year as “not awful”. I also felt held by the ones in my life who love me. No matter what is happening in their own worlds, my parents always manage to make us feel treasured. Even in the loss of Grandaddy, it was another reminder of the ways our extended family carries in and holds each other. Even with my kids scattered across the United States (at least the eastern side), they were so good to keep us informed and involved. Kraig is the only guy I know who can commit so fully to the things he commits to and also make me feel so held. My friends, my book club, my lunch group, my students, my yearbook staff, my social media friends, my coworkers, my admin, my clients… so many people who made such a difference every single day in my life. Perhaps the most unexpected and sweetest relationships from this year have been with my hexmates, two of whom are new (either to our hex or our school). 

As a strange contrast to, or maybe it’s just a further exploration of, my 2024 word, I think my biggest area of growth this year has been learning to let some things go. I guess I have started to figure out what deserves to be held and what needs to be released. I still have a very long way to go in this area, but every time I say, “It doesn’t matter to me, whatever you want to do” about something that would have driven me crazy the year before, I have a little party in my brain. 

As I move forward into a new year, I’m feeling very settled. That’s a purposeful word choice. Often we say we are excited about the coming year. I think 2024 battered me enough that excited isn’t the word I would use, but I am settled. I’m ready. I have a plan. I’ve held on through the mountaintops and the valleys and I’m here for a new year. 

Grace

 Last year, I found myself saying to someone that, “I’ve never had two seniors graduating at the same time, one going through the process for a service academy appointment, while I was also a teacher of seniors while working a side job(s) and producing a yearbook and parenting other kids and being a wife.”

I was saying that to explain some balls I had dropped, and some plates that had stopped spinning. Was it presented as an excuse? I guess it kind of was, and could be taken as such, but it made me step back and think to myself how true it was. I had done several of those things before, and I had already parented three seniors through to graduation, but none of the times before compared to doubling everything AND helping Angela with all the service academy hoops. 

And it wasn’t that I messed up on purpose, or even that I took on too much, it was merely that I didn’t KNOW what would prove to be too much because it was my first time. 

I’ve actually thought about it a lot since. We had never collectively lived through a pandemic before. I know people dealing with chronic or terminal diagnoses who have never lived with something like that before. Some people in my circle have never suffered tremendous losses and grieved loved ones before. And it’s not all bad things, either. 

The good, the great, can still be complicated when you’re a novice at them. Some people have never worked this fabulous new job before. Some have never had a spouse to factor into everything before. First time parents have never adjusted to a baby’s schedule before. Second time parents have never had to figure out how to shower while a toddler and an infant are looked after. 

Think for a second about how many things in our lives, just today or this week or month or year, we are doing for the first time. All of us.

And maybe, just maybe, we could all be a little more understanding of and patient with each other. 

Several years ago, I saw a quote that said, “May grace be my first response.”

I often get around to grace, but I’m ashamed to say that it is seldom my first response. I told my students all of first semester, this schedule is brand new to me too. I’ll give you grace but I need it in return. And we did, all of us, because we made it a point to ask for it, to be aware of the intentionality of grace.

So maybe as we go through this life, it would do us good to remember all the things that people are doing for the very first time, and grace can be our first response instead of the one we get to after damage has already been done.

Practicing the Art of Abiding

 I usually write this blog post on New Year’s Eve, before the family comes over to Sandy’s for pizza and games and the turning of the clock. This year I did a lot of reflecting in the days prior to December 31, and I considered writing the blog post then, but I decided to wait.

Never has there been a more clear illustration of my 2023 word than the one I am experiencing in this moment. 

I’m writing this blog on my phone from a chair beside my mom’s hospital bed. It’s the first New Year’s Eve I haven’t spent with Kraig since we got engaged, the first I’ve ever been away from my kiddos. Yesterday, when I received word that she had been admitted (originally due to Flu A and a super low pulse ox but now kept for heart issues), I grabbed my stuff, kissed my family goodbye, and left WV for Tennessee so that my sister could leave the hospital and sit with my dad, who also has the flu at home. We thought she was going to be going home today, then the heart stuff ramped up, so we spent the day waiting on cardiology consults and a plan. If you’ve ever spent time in a hospital at the mercy of everyone else, you know how that went. Even now, no one has explicitly said we are here for the night but it’s 9:09 and that seems assumed. 

… to remain, to stay… … to wait for, to await…

In truth, I wasn’t super pumped about this word. I worried that there was going to be a tortuous event or situation that I was going to have to tolerate, to pay the price of. But I always feel very strongly that my words of the year come from the Lord and so if I was going to need to be reminded of the ability to stay, I was going to be relieved that He was beside me.

I ended up seeing glimmers of what my word meant. It wasn’t a word that I was constantly reminded of, like 2022’s Shivelight. But instead it was a word I regularly reminded myself of.

As our entire family life changed, I had to abide in our new normal. I had to be left behind and abide in missing my kiddos but also watching them develop new lives in their new places. And MAN was that fun!

Regarding my health, I had to both abide and also push. I am so grateful for that day in September when I had a scary heart moment at school and had two people tell me what I needed to say to my doctor in order to get results. I’m thankful I saw a different doctor that next week, a PA who listened to me and immediately took action, setting all factors in place for a specialist to schedule a Halloween pacemaker. My life has been changed for the better and I am forever thankful for that.

Abide for me this year was a reminder of the ways He is beside us in all of the moments— big and little, high and low. He’s here in the crazy busy and when life comes to a grinding halt. He’s here when we are surrounded by people and when we are alone in a big empty house. He’s here to help when I take on too much and He’s here when I’m working to hold it all together.

Abide. 2023 was a year of abiding.

And honestly, when I look back on 2023, MAN was it an incredible year. I did have to grow a lot and learn a lot, but the high points were SO HIGH.

I told my mom, if all I did in 2023 was take our big family trip to Alaska (best trip of my life to date) and get a pacemaker, it would be a winner of a year. I repeated that to a friend, and told her that then you add in all of the AMAZING moments and accomplishments of my graduating seniors, watching Emma and Roman solidify their paths and achieve, seeing Francisco start to rebuild some roads and bridges, take more INCREDIBLE trips like our Empty Nest Fall Break trip to Europe, see my travel business meet and exceed the goals I set for myself a year ago, and take the UTTER JOY I am receiving from yearbook and… dadGUM 2023– you killed it. My friend then added, “And skydiving and getting to finally take kids to Model UN again” and YES! That too! 

I have some work to do in 2024, some things I let slip in 2023 (mainly the second half of the year, and I think because I just kind of STOPPED in order to sort of reward myself for the utter insanity of things that I managed to pull of during the first half of the year), but I’m up for it. 

My fears of this year’s word meaning it was going to be a year I had to tolerate didn’t pan out at all. The synonyms of abide are tarry, live, persevere, endure, bear, and support. In 2023, I LIVED. I persevered with Him supporting me every step. I’m headed into 2024 stronger from the abiding I did in 2023. And filled with joy at all that filled me in this previous year.

The picture with this blog post is not the best picture of me ever taken… even the best taken this year… or even the best taken on that particular trip. But it’s a picture that was taken without me knowing it was being taken, and I have never seen a candid photo of me that captures my sheer joy in a moment like that one does. We were on the whale watching boat and I was absolutely filled with delight with everything in my life at that time. It was utter, raw, pure, unadulterated JOY. That’s the abiding that 2023 gave me.

"Moses My Servant is Dead."

 My pastor preached today out of Joshua. It was a powerful sermon, focused on the command that the Lord gives Joshua (and Joseph, and Peter, and Job and many others) to "ARISE!"

But I'm going to be honest, I struggled to get past the first words of Joshua 1:

"After the death of Moses, the servant of the Lord, the Lord said to Joshua son of Nun, Moses' aide: "Moses my servant is dead. Now then, you and all these people, get ready to cross the Jordan River into the land I am about to give to them-- to the Israelites."

In my personal devotional time, I'm doing a study on the book of Exodus. So I'm all tied up with Moses in my heart. I relate so much to Moses in the beginning of his call, when he proclaims his fear of speaking and begs God to find someone else. I think Moses was probably someone who struggled a little with anxiety and a lack of self-confidence, so it means all the more to me that the Lord used him to do these incredible things I am reading about every day. Yesterday my reading was about the Passover, and the absolutely human and very unholy thought I had as I read was, "Oh my gosh, these directions are SO SPECIFIC! I would never have been able to remember what to tell the people to do, and heaven knows people in today's time would never have listened and followed the directions!"

But as I see Moses do allllllll of these things, or more specifically see God do alllllllll of these things through Moses, I am a perfect illustration of dramatic irony because I know the ending, the things that Moses and his people did not know when they were living it. I know that Moses, as much as he trusted God and accomplished for him, did not get to see the Promised Land. He died in the desert.

He died in the desert. There wasn't a homecoming for him, a congratulatory party, a book signing, an awards ceremony... just a discouraging death in a dry place, not having seen the end of the story. His story ended in the desert. 

Joshua's story started with the entry into the Promised Land, but as my pastor preached today, it wasn't all "promise". A lot of it was "problem", like having people who angered God and having to circumcise grown men. And honestly, that beginning isn't exactly auspicious. "Moses, my servant, is dead. Now then you..." Not, "Hey, Joshua! You are the guy! I've been so excited for you to lead these people because I knew you were the best man for the job." Nope, more "Moses was my number one man, and he messed up, so now it's on you. And you're not exactly a number one, you're more of a number two. But even number one couldn't do it without messing up, so... good luck, number two." (I know that's not what He was saying, but Joshua was a human and I'm sure it sounded a little like that to him.)

I think sometimes I get really wrapped up on what seems "fair". I am a big fan of closure. I like neat and tidy beginnings and endings. If Moses started the journey, then it seems only right that Moses get to finish it, not this second-string Joshua guy. (And listen, I actually love Joshua and his story is one of my favorites. But for right now, I'm thinking of Moses.)

But what I often forget is that the journey, the story, goes far beyond one career or one lifetime or one generation, even. The story stretches the entire scope of humanity. And while it may seem only fair to me that I get to see the fruition of the labors I engage in, I might not. And I also might mess up and someone else may have to take the mantle from me. 

I don't think Moses died feeling slighted. The Lord showed him all that would belong to Israel, and the Bible says his eyes nor his strength were weak. It goes on to say that no one else has done what Moses did in the eyes of the Lord. The will of the Lord stretches far beyond one man or one lifetime. Moses had a part to play, a huge part, and he played it so well. Then Joshua's part started. And on it went, person after person. And it continues today with me and with you.

Abide.

 I guess since I wrote my December 31 post on January 15, I might as well also write my January 1 post on January 15. :)

abide: verb

1. to wait;

2. to pause;

3. to watch;

4. to stay;

5. to continue in a place;

6. to continue without fading or being lost;

7. to remain stable or fixed in some state or condition;

8. to be left;

9. to stand up under;

10. to await submissively

I think it was late October, maybe November, when I felt the Lord give me my 2023 word. And here's the truth: I did not want this one.

I was hoping for "adventure", or "bloom", or "flourish". I'm waiting for "sunshine" and "fun", but so far I haven't gotten those. :) I like to GO, I don't want to ABIDE. I want to DO, not ABIDE. Abide is BORING.

Or maybe "abide" is terrifying. When I started to know very clearly that my word was "abide", the fear started to set it. What if my word is "abide" because I'm going to get a terminal diagnosis this year and He wants me to learn to rest in it? What if it's "abide" because some tragedy is going to befall my family and He wants to teach me to trust? What if any number of awful things???

And then the reason I need this word was made perfectly clear: Worry and anxiety are direct results of an inability to abide. As long as I am abiding in Him, I am trusting His hand and His path. It's when I stop abiding and start trying to handle it myself that the anxiety and fear set in. 

I also just wrote in my 2022 reflection that I did not do a good job in a daily commitment to His disciplines this past year, and I want to do better this year. I want to abide in His word and His voice. My pastor said on the first Sunday of the new year that we are terrible at waiting on the Lord in silence, we try to fill the space with talking, and that's surely me. To learn to abide means to learn to wait, to listen.

In addition, I'm a mom who is going to wake up to a relatively empty house in a few short months. Emma will get a place with a 12 month lease, so the home visits will change and become less frequent. The last two will graduate and go away to college. The middle, while back in the house this semester living at home while going to Lee, may decide to move back on campus or somewhere else. After living in a household of 7 people as recently as March of 2020, the whole "to be left" part is pretty obvious. And within that, the "continue to be without fading or being lost" seems very relevant too because I will be the first to say that a lot of my identity is tied up in momming the kids in my house.

My goals for this year are the same as every year for about the past 4... I just want to continue to refine the habits I have already started. And in it, I want to learn to abide.

"He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the Lord, 'My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust." ~Psalms 91:1-2

"You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you." ~John 15:16

Nothing Like a December 31 Post on January 15

 All day on New Years Eve, I kept thinking that I need to go upstairs and do my NYE reflection. And all day I just couldn't. I haven't been in a writing mode very much at all this year, and I'm not sure why. I did a ton of reading, so maybe my brain wanted to exercise intake rather than output, I don't know.

Whatever the reason, I want to do a late reflections on 2022. Just for myself, just to leave here so I can revisit it later.

What a year. My calendar years are never neat and tidy, because the school year breaks them into two parts, and so there is seldom any sort of thread that can be traced through an entire calendar year and this one is no different.

The first half of 2022 was a continuation of the last half of 2021 as far as school years go and... holy cow. We kept a written record (that we left a TON of stuff off of because the absurd was so dang commonplace that eventually we didn't even notice it, to be honest) of that school year because no one would ever believe it was real. My students, my classes? AMAZING. Everything else? No words. (There are, but lots of them I can't publicly reflect on, haha.) I'll just leave this statistic right here: My department of 11 in August had lost 6 teachers by May. We started the 2022 school year with 6 teachers who were brand new to CHS (two of whom had come in January, but still). I think CHS hired like 30-something new teachers for the 2022-2023 school year and the middle school was almost as high. The first half of 2022 was spent professionally just wondering WHAT is happening, HOW do we fix it, and CAN I outlast it. I will say that I found something beautiful inside of myself, something that knew without a shadow of a doubt that I'm where I'm supposed to be and that I'm doing exactly what I'm supposed to do. I can tighten the belt and still be fine because when you're doing the Lord's work, He equips you. And that's how I see my job, truly. Once I came to that re-realization, I was in a good place and I've been in a good place professionally for the second half of 2022. In fact, a wonderful place. I've accepted a new-old leadership role, I've mentored new teachers, and I've taken on two new classes in 2022 (one was English II Honors just for the one spring class and it was SO AWESOME and the other was yearbook on my planning period during the second half of the fall semester, and I have it full time now and it's been wonderful). It's really wild, what has started to happen in some ways, and that is that I seem to be returning to my teaching roots a little bit. I have 8 years left and it's starting to feel like I may finish this thing out in many of the same ways I started it. And that's awesome. 

The first half of 2022 brought the highest of highs for a few kids, the lowest of lows for another, and some challenges for another. We had a week in April/May when, and this is totally bragging I guess but it is what it is, for three days in a row, every single day a huge honor or award came to one of our three high schoolers. Angela was named JRTOC Cadet Corps Commander for her upcoming senior year, Kelsey was voted Student Body Vice-President for her upcoming senior year, and Roman won literally like 5 or 6 of the local scholarships at Senior Night. A few weeks before that week, Kelsey and Angela were selected to be the two juniors to attend Girls' State and Roman was awarded the Rymer Gold Scholarship. Those were the highest highs we could have dreamed of, and the Lord truly gave all that we ask or imagine. In March, though, and on into April, we faced a really difficult situation with one of our children and, for a period of time, we didn't even know where he was. I never imagined myself parenting in something like that, and I guess in a lot of ways I have been shown that it doesn't matter who you are or what you've done or what you believe or how you live, we are every one susceptible to being shown that you can do everything possible and sometimes it's still not enough, because your kids have free will. 

The second half of 2022 has brought the most awesome senior year for our two youngest. They are carpeing the diem, they are leading well, they are doing awesome in school, Kelsey was voted Homecoming Queen, and Angela got two nominations to the Air Force Academy and one to the Naval Academy (still waiting to see if she gets either appointment). Emma had an incredible first semester of her sophomore year and is flourishing at UTC. Roman learned that college is a lot different from high school and had some major stress and close calls with his grades, but he squeaked by and kept those scholarships. And Francisco is doing really well, working landscaping and becoming more like his old happy self. 

Kraig freaking wrote on a piece of paper on January 1, 2022, that he wanted to run a marathon and on October 9, 2022, he did it. In Chicago. The Chicago marathon. Because if you're going to go, why not go BIG. :) I'm just so proud of him for battling his diabetes (and conquering it), and showing our kids what it means to be disciplined and dedicated and driven. He ran late at night so as not to miss family time, he ran while a kid biked, he trained, and he did it. He will tell you that, due to an injury during the race, he did not finish anywhere near where he would have liked, so he's not finished with marathons. He had to try again.

The second half of 2022 brought a tremendous loss on Thanksgiving Day, when one of our closest families from our young married/young parenting days, were in a car accident and two of them were killed.  The horror from that middle of the night phone call with my friend will never fade for me. The memorial service at the college freshman's college, the double funeral in Canton... I just sat there in shock that it was really happening and that my friend and her surviving daughter were somehow finding the strength to put one foot in front of the other. My heart remains crushed for the two of them.

I had a really good year as far as self-discipline and organization and goals. I tracked everything, which always helps me, and was able to see what worked and what didn't. There were definitely emotional ups and downs, but the time from May to December was a period of mostly level ground, which is the best. 

My very favorite part of my personal life this year is that I started a new job, a side job working as a travel advisor! It's been a lot different than I expected (and, frankly, a lot harder), but MAN when it works, does it ever work! I'm finally getting the hang of it, I think, and it's a ton of fun. I hope it ends up being something I can do in retirement as well.

Speaking of travel... we did Congaree National Park in February while Emma went to see a friend at USC (kayaked it!), Mammoth Cave in March (just me and the three high schoolers-- had a blast!), Kelsey had Girls State week at Lipscomb, Shenandoah National Park and DC and Annapolis in June (Angela was accepted to the Naval Academy Summer Seminar so we made a trip of it when we took her), CMAFest with Kelsey in June (we benefitted from the kindness and generosity of an amazing friend and got to have VIP passes with some other CHS kids and moms), Bear Paw several times, took the camper to Pigeon Forge (also, we got a camper!), in September Kraig and I went on an anniversary cruise to New England, in October for fall break the two high schoolers and Kraig and I did the first half of the week in the Keys (Everglades NP and Biscayne, Dry Tortugas was canceled due to the hurricane damage) and the second half in Chicago for the marathon (and Indiana Dunes NP), I took Angela and Roman to Tupelo for him to hang with his girlfriend and Angela and I had a blast, Kelsey went to Florida for fall retreat, and then we all went to WV in November and December. SUCH a great year of stealing every moment we could to make a memory. 

Spiritually, this was a year where I definitely leaned on the Lord frequently, but I am sorry to say that it was NOT a year of walking closely beside Him every day. I mean, I did, but I didn't commit the time to regular study and His word, and I intend to fix that this year in 2023. Even still, He showed me so many things and He took care of us so well.

My 2022 word was "Shivelight", which means rays of light that pierce through a canopy of trees. I vowed in January 1 to spend the coming year looking for the light, even when it was dark. I would say, especially as I think back on it now, that Shivelight was the perfect word for this year. It was so bright at times, but so dark at others. And I truly did train myself to always look for the light, which was very helpful when I was living the hardest school year known to man and had a kid whose whereabouts were unknown. I wish He had not decide to give me so many opportunities to practice it, but I am surely glad for those rays that pierced the darkness.

We spent some time on one of the last days in 2022 driving to a mountaintop to do a quick hike (short but totally uphill) right at sunset. I had read that the sunset from there is astounding and that was the perfect weather day for a great sunset. I told my people to take warm clothes and shoes they could walk in, and that we would use flashlights to come down. What I did NOT take into account was that there was still snow on the ground on this mountain from the WV snows a week or so earlier. And so, the awesome and amazing idea and plan was completely thwarted as we slipped and slid around on a mountainside, trying to get to the top to see the reward. Instead, because I was afraid someone would get hurt (and probably that that someone would be me), we decided to give up and return (carefully) to the car. It was a good laugh and fun bonding experience, no one (including me) truly felt cheated of the sunset. But from below, through the trees, we could see the glorious light from that sunset. We didn't get the full picture, but we got the rays. And sometimes, as 2022 showed me, the rays will have to be enough. 

A Season of Hope

Last Sunday at church, we heard a pretty incredible sermon. My pastor talked about salvation and about the fact that we are never too broken to be redeemed, never too dirty to be worthy of Him. If I’m being honest, although it was a POWERFUL sermon, it wasn’t one that specifically felt like it was speaking to me directly at this point in my life the way some sermons feel. 

Then, just at the end, Lord spoke to that house and then my pastor said these words: “Heal us, help us, and fill us with hope.” 

And immediately after that, I got a clear sense of the season the Lord has brought me to.

From August to December, I was in a deep, dark place. I was angry and I was fearful and I was broken-hearted. Many of those factors through which I defined myself had been destroyed or aged out or been taken away. 

Here , in January, I wrote about the mending that He was showing me and providing, and while the post was about the parent-child relationships I knew of, more in me was being mended than relationships. He was healing ME.

In February, it became very clear that He was helping me. In order to come to a place where I could receive help, I had to first figure out where the wounds were for them to be healed. Once that was done, He sent the words of others and new perspectives to allow for the helping to come. I wrote about the help Here.

Sunday, at the end of church, I saw where I am now and hopefully where I am headed in 2022… to a place of hope. My 2022 word is “shivelight”, which I have translated into looking for the bright spots. That’s what hope is, it’s the bright spots. 

Angela hopes to get into the Air Force Academy and after being very optimistic for a while, I had come to a place in the last few months of, not just being doubtful that it would happen, but even feeling a lack of trust in the prayer I had prayed— that if it’s not meant to be, He will close the door in favor of opening those that need to be opened. Last week, she got her acceptance into the Summer Seminar at the US Naval Academy. This is huge on many levels but, as I told a close friend, it just gives me a new sense of HOPE that it IS a possibility for her big dreams to be fulfilled. 

I had prayed the same for Roman and college, that if he’s meant to be at one school the money will be provided and if he’s not, it won’t. It didn’t look like it was going to happen and so we had taken steps to prepare for the other school and suddenly this week, a letter came and the hope is back. 

I have renewed hope in the future of my job. I have renewed hope in a new side job. I have renewed hope in my children’s futures and in mine and Kraig’s upcoming years. 

He has moved me into a season of hope, and while I don’t know how long this season will be, I am grateful and hungry for it.

Stone Memorials

At the very end of service yesterday, the praise and worship team started to sing a song that I have not heard in YEARS but a song that I consider a stone memorial of sorts for me.

Back in February of 2017, it did not look like our adoption was going to happen because the paperwork did not look possible in the 4 week timeframe it had leading to the deadline. I stood in church the morning that I wrote this post and Travis Greene’s “Made a Way” was played. In that post, I detail how the Lord spoke directly to my soul (after having used that song only four months earlier) to reassure me that He was going to do it. And in that post from February 2017, I mention that one day in the future I will hear that song and the promise will be fulfilled. The way will have already been made and we will be living it.

Yesterday, during that ending of service, that song again became a promise and a fulfillment. We have had high hopes for each of our kids since they came here and there have been moments of grave doubt and moments of fear and moments of insane joy. This past week, we were in moments of insane joy as a huge dream of Angela’s is starting to look very possible and a hope we had actually kind of given up on for Roman suddenly became very possible. We WERE, literally, standing in that moment on March 6, 2022, holding onto an email and a college letter that happened only “because You made a way.” 

And yet in the midst of that, there is heartbreak and loss and grief for another. For that, we are…. 

“Standing here not knowing how we'll get through this test
But holding unto faith You know that
Nothing can catch You by surprise
You got this figured out and You're watching us now
But when it looks as if we can't win
You wrap us in Your arm and step in
And everything we need You supply
You got this in control
And now we know that

There is nothing that’s impossible.”

I had the family devotional last night, and I used Joshua 4 as my text. 

1 When all the nation had finished passing over the Jordan, the Lord said to Joshua, 3 and command them, saying, ‘Take twelve stones from here out of the midst of the Jordan, from the very place where the priests' feet stood firmly, and bring them over with you and lay them down in the place where you lodge tonight.’” 4 Then Joshua called the twelve men from the people of Israel, whom he had appointed, a man from each tribe. 5 And Joshua said to them, “Pass on before the ark of the Lord your God into the midst of the Jordan, and take up each of you a stone upon his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the people of Israel, 6 that this may be a sign among you. When your children ask in time to come, ‘What do those stones mean to you?’ 7 then you shall tell them that the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. When it passed over the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. So these stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial forever.” 21 And he said to the people of Israel, “When your children ask their fathers in times to come, ‘What do these stones mean?’ 23 For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan for you until you passed over, as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea, which he dried up for us until we passed over, 24 so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, that you may fear the Lord your God forever.” - Joshua 4:1,3-7,21,23-24

I talked to them about those stone memorials. We all have those moments in life where God’s faithfulness was proven and we return to them, either through a song or a verse or a geographic location or a date in time where we are reminded, and we need to share that testimony with others. 

For me, that song will always be a stone memorial. And for me yesterday, it not only proved His faithfulness in where we have been, it gave me strength and faith in where we are going. I had no idea when I did that devotional last night with my family that today would bring about a new test, new fears and grief. But because my faith was strengthened last night and because I shared with them, I am better able to face today’s situation.

“He moves mountains. He causes walls to fall. With his power, He performs miracles. There is nothing that’s impossible. And we’re standing here only because He made a way.”

The Valleys and the Peaks

I watched a documentary this weekend called "14 Peaks". It's about a Nepali climber named Nims Purja who, along with his team, attempts to summit all of the 14 highest peaks (8,000 meters) in the world in seven months. Their dream was called "Project Possible" and it seemed impossible. They actually did 3 of the mountains (including Everest) in 48 hours. Insanity. For the last one, the Chinese government had blocked all access to it and the entire worldwide climbing community (and outside of it) got involved in petitioning the Chinese government to let him climb it. They finally got permission and the footage of the first part of that climb and the insane weather around made me think they were going to get that far only to have to give up. However... the subtitle of the movie is "Nothing is Impossible" and they certainly proved that.

Spoiler alert, they succeeded. And in just over six months time. 

I've always thought it was interesting how mountains are used as metaphors for two completely opposite things. They are used to describe the obstacles in our paths, the seemingly impossible, as they were in several of our praise and worship songs today, and they are also used to describe the peak experiences in life and the "valleys" are used to describe the hard times. 

I've watched a lot of climbing documentaries lately ("Free Solo", "The Alpinist", this one, "The Dawn Wall") and have started to follow some climbers on instagram. What I have realized is that most climbing deaths don't happen on the ascent or from the summit. They happen during the descent. I've read a little bit about why that might be, and I don't have a theory of my own because I'm not a climber (I just might be a little obsessed with it), but I think that the riskiest part of a climb being the descent fits in with those contradictory mountain metaphors mentioned above.

In all of the climbing documentaries I have watched, not a single climber being interviewed has ever one time said, "And that was my last mountain. I am officially finished." In fact, at the end of every interview and article, the journalist will ask, "So what's next?" and they always have an answer, even if they are evasive as to the details at that point in time. 

The descent of the mountains, the valleys between the mountains, they are all part of the process of moving toward the next mountain. 

If you want to see the metaphor of the mountain as the obstacle, that definitely works. When I watched Nims and his team approaching each of those 14 mountains and the camera panned up, I thought HOW ON THIS ENTIRE EARTH can they look up at that and think of reaching the top. 

You know how they did it every single time, usually while the camera was still panning? They started walking. Not even climbing at that point, just walking. And then the walking turned to climbing and the climbing turned to defying gravity and completing the impossible by summiting the peak.

Goal accomplished, right? They'll usually make some statement like that, take a pic of themselves giving a thumbs up, etc.. And I guess as far as the record books are concerned, they did it. But as far as the climber and his or her life is concerned, it's not finished until they are safely back down.

But then once they are down, all they want to think about and do is plan for the next trip up the next peak. The valley is the obstacle to get through in order to have another "peak experience". 

And on.

And on.

And on.

And I guess that's how this life rocks on too, huh? It's a series of valleys and peaks, and somehow the valleys and the peaks are both the obstacle and the high, the rest and the work, the grief and the joy. 

Still Enough

 There are about a thousand things I cannot publicly say about the 2021-2022 school year but I'll just give you the understatement of the year and say:

It's been a challenge.

And because I can't stand to see teachers make vague comments and then wonder if it's my kid they're talking about, let me also offer this clarification:

The kids in room 220 have been ZERO PERCENT of the cause of that challenge. I always tend to adore my students, but this year it has been above and beyond. The absolute most perfect little AP class, a group that makes me feel completely comfortable and loved every single minute, a group that is so dang mature and perceptive that I sometimes wonder how they are real... An awesomely fun senior English class last semester, a group that never gave me a dull moment and worked hard... A Holocaust Lit class that could not have been a better group of human beings, just a joy to teach and so focused and caring and smart and kind... a senior English class this semester that laughs at more of my pitiful jokes than any class ever has and that has a higher level of attention to Macbeth than I have ever seen, plus they are just sweet... an English II Honors class that came out of nowhere and fell into my lap and that I have decided was a singular gift from God meant to reward me for making it to May this year, they are so perfect. So the kids? The kids are fine. Better than fine, actually.

But this year has been hard and in some ways it's only getting harder and big changes have come and are coming on a lot of levels and I've had to work through a lot of things for myself over the past month and a half. It's not a secret to say that turnover in education is currently very high and only projected to climb higher, and that is true at the local level as well. And truthfully, it's tough to be the one "left there", in a sense. I don't judge those who have left and are leaving, not one bit. But I have realized through some pretty heartbreaking dreams I have had (one in which I woke sobbing) that I have some abandonment issues that this is awakening. I am also revisiting some really deeply buried insecurities that I haven't seen in about fifteen years or more that center on "settling" and "selling out". 

I remember in high school, hearing all of those around me talk about wanting to get out of Cleveland and feeling like there was something wrong with me because I wanted to stay. I remember in college, switching my major to English and knowing it was what I was meant to do, but also hearing it echo in my head, "Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach." I remember (and it still happens today) talking to others about their lives and their jobs and, when asked about "what's new with you", only having this to say: "Oh, same things as the past 21 years, just living in Cleveland and teaching and raising a family!" 

In my heart, I don't feel like any of those things are "just" things. I am doing exactly what I planned to do, what I longed to do, what I set out to do. And truthfully, most days I feel that I am doing all of it pretty dang well. 

But in this mad rush for the door that is happening nationwide, I don't have the option to go. Would I, if I did? I don't know. I think if several things in this state go the way I think they are going to go, I would very seriously consider it. I would miss the kids something fierce, but I might go. But the fact of the matter is that it doesn't matter because the option for me does not exist. I am here. Where I will stay until I turn out those lights in 11 years for the last time and take my $3/sick day or whatever it is and my stacks of novels bought from McKays with my money and my bulletin board of photographs and my yard sale purchased furniture and my 4.0 Banquet trophies and my bags of student letters and cards and drive away from 850 Raider Dr for the last time.

So because the option to go isn't there, I am in a situation where I have shape my perspective in whatever way I need to for me to be able to peacefully stay. I have to to find the good in the things I will be living with for 11 more years and see that as self-preservation, not selling out. This week I had to do some hard work inside my heart and brain and sort through these feelings and thoughts. There were tears and there was pressing down on the bruise and wounds, pressing that didn't feel good but was necessary in order to see where the hurts were that needed to heal. 

At the absolute height of rifling through my rolodex of emotions this week, literally out of the clear blue, I got a fb message from a former student who is probably pushing mid-30's now. And it shouldn't be surprising to know that God used this kid-turned-man to say exactly the words my heart needed to find the strength to face the inner demons and to find what I needed to move forward. The number of times this has happened in a 21 year career, when I have gotten a message in one of a hundred different formats and platforms that was precisely what I needed to hear (and often from a completely unexpected source, either a kid I didn't even get particularly those to or from a "kid" who is now a grown adult with a family of his or her own), is innumerable. God has always used the written word to encourage me and I love His timing.

So to every teacher out there who is feeling some of what I was feeling or all of what I was feeling or possibly even more and bigger of what I was feeling... 

Claim this message for yourself too today. No matter what has changed, and no matter what WILL change, you are "still enough". Now excuse me while I go cry again at the impeccable timing of this beautiful message.

Everything Flows Downstream

Image: New River Gorge NP, Endless Wall Trail

 Last night, on a rare kidless weekend, Kraig and I seized the opportunity to attend a film festival I had heard about that was happening in Chattanooga, the Lookout Wild Film Festival. It was absolutely an incredible night of films, both shorts and the feature length ("River Runner"). 

We saw these films:

• Our Theory of Human Motivation  (3)

• Homeland –  Undiscovered Trails Of The Kackar Mountains (4)

• Camp Yoshi (10) 

• Kyra: An Olympic Story  (8)

• The Wanderlust Women (8)

• Latitude (9)

• The Outlaw Sport (8)

• Spirit of the Peaks  (42)

• Katie (10) 

• The River Runner  (86)

I absolutely loved "Our Theory of Human Motivation", "Camp Yoshi", and "Katie". In one of them (possibly "Spirit of the Peaks"), the statement was made that "everything flows downstream". It was referencing water sources and pure water and the fact that the snowmelt is what provides water for those downstream and that we don't think about even the smallest ways that we pollute such as the wax from snowboards, and so on. But the minute it was said, it struck me.

Everything flows downstream.

Everything we do has repercussions "downstream". Everything we say, every action we take, every decision we make. It is all going to impact other people in some way, and it's also going to impact us in the future. We may not see the immediate consequence or benefit (because this doesn't have to just consider the negative side), but it will show up eventually.

What are we putting in the water today, in the world and in our lives, that's going to impact us in the future? Are we taking care of our business, are we making positive choices, are we considering the other people around us? Or are we dumping our trash, making rash choices without considering the future, polluting the lives of those around us? Do we make things better for our future selves and those who are impacted by us, or do we make them worse?

It's an image that is going to stay with me for a while, I feel certain. I plan to ask myself regularly if this is something I want to see later, if "downstream" for this situation or decision or action will look favorable or unfavorable.

Dream-Launch

 Today, I witnessed the launch of a dream. 

My pastor and my friend, my prayer warrior and fellow mama in the trenches, now published author, Dawn Lipsey launched her book. I had the privilege of reading it during the final editing stages, and it is absolutely a Word from the Lord. There are certain motifs in this book that have lived in my head since I read it in November. It is no doubt going to minister to people where they are, and move them to walk forward through and into what the Lord has for them.

Watching the culmination of this God-dream of hers got me thinking about my own dreams. 

Dreams realized, dreams deferred, dreams still germinating, dreams I am in the middle of living...

And with that, I also started to think about the periods of time when dreams are dead. When the soil of our hearts is dry and cracked, when there isn't a cherished seed that we take out from time to time to nurture, treasure, and then tuck back into fertile soil. 

I know people in the midst of each of these stages and phases of dream-growth right now. 

As I watched Dawn, teary-eyed and smiling, greet the long line of people who came by after church to congratulate her and purchase books and shirts and bags and caps, I thought of all of the hours she spent laboring over this work. I thought about the discouragement she mentioned in her sermon, the starts and stops, and the fear of failure. I thought about the call of the Lord on her to write and the ways she said she tried to adjust the call to fit what she knew to be her giftings, rather than push forward into the uncomfortable unknown outside of her comfort zone. 

And I vowed to remember what the launch looks like when I'm in the other periods of my own dream-growth. To keep the end in my heart, even when my head is bogged down in the muck of the process.

Thank you, Dawn, for leading us well in so many ways, but mostly for living what you preach.